Astronomers have found a strange new species in the cosmic zoo: a microquasar that emits gamma rays. The rare beast would be a new source for gamma rays, which have even higher energies than x-rays. The finding suggests that microquasars have more power than astronomers knew.

To regulate the amount of fat that swaddles the body, the body has to tell the brain how much food it needs. Now researchers report that a molecule that helps synthesize fat also tells the brain when to feel the munchies. Blocking the enzyme, they found, causes the animals to lose weight.

The liver has amazing powers of regeneration. Unlike most organs, it can regrow--even after as much as half of its tissue has been surgically removed. Now researchers have found that the credit may not go to the liver itself: New human liver cells come from bone marrow.

Titanic explosions that emit powerful flashes of energetic gamma rays are one of astronomy's hottest mysteries. Now an analysis of the nearest gamma ray burst yet detected has added weight to the popular theory that they are expelled during the death throes of supermassive stars.

Astronomers have discovered the first extraterrestrial sugar, sweetening up the center of the Milky Way. Because sugar molecules are essential ingredients of DNA and other biological building blocks, the finding will help scientists model how life might have begun.